Silent Night
by Gnathix
Summary: Todd hears mysterious noises and comes to check on Johnny. Single chapter. This is my first published fanfiction, so all feedback is appreciated. **Update 12/2016: Revisions made.


It was dark in the living room, just barely lit in flat grays by distant streetlamps. Cold air seeped in through a crack in the doorway. The floorboards squeaked, which was unusual – they only ever made noises when giving way to his boots and limp bodies, crinkling in black garbage bags.

With a jolt of realization, Johnny sat alert on the couch. He had been sleeping. Not good, not good at all. And whoever this was, they weren't him, and they were presumably still kicking. He was relieved to hear their footwork was hesitant – an easy takedown. But to saunter towards him in his weakest state, they still presented a threat.

A moment or two passed between each hollow wooden creak. Every time he accustomed himself to the quiet, it happened again. There was not much distance between the two of them. Fully awake now, he noted they were very soft footsteps – even lighter than his own fragile frame.

His heart jumped a little as he glimpsed the edge of a shadow in motion, mere feet away. In preparation to accost the intruder, he groped around for the nearest weapon he could find – a thin metal fork was lodged by the prongs in the sofa cushions. This would do. He was much more acquainted with knives and that sort, but was by no means unaccustomed to more...creative approaches. The handle was soon poised in a cold, clammy hand, the tines readied to open flesh. He sat up on his toes, knees bent outwards, like a gangling stone gargoyle.

But his guard dropped nigh instantaneously when a small, wavering voice broke the room.

"Hello?"

Johnny sat still a moment, still hesitant, but his grip on the silverware loosened. "...Squee?"

Tiny feet shuffled in the dark. "Yes."

In what seemed like a single movement, a pair of thin legs hopped over the couch, hands swatted the wall, and the light flickered on, beaming yellow. A boot kicked the door closed with a swift click. They both squinted at each other, Johnny's hand still over the switch, and strangely, Squee noted, gripping a fork.

"Uh, hello," Johnny stammered, "What are you doing here?"

Todd examined him for a beat, as he stood there in the corner. _He looks likes a coat rack_ , he thought to himself, _because he stands so still, and he is pretty tall, but he isn't very big at all_. Poorly concealed fear rang in his voice. "You were screaming. But...not like usual."

"Not like usual?" Johnny cocked a brow, and then furrowed them in confusion. "...Wait, I was screaming?"

"Yeah. You're usually mad. But this time you were scared. And then you stopped." The child stared up at him sagely. "I thought you died. But I guess you didn't."

He frowned a little, confused, and blinked slowly, still adjusting to the light. "I guess not."

He couldn't decide why a skittish thing like Squee would come rushing in at night, just to see if the Scary Neighbor Man was still alive, especially considering he was screaming. _I_ __ _certainly wouldn't check on someone screaming to themselves in_ _ _their__ _house at night_ , he thought, _and that's coming from a murderer, and murderers don't tend to be skittish, after all_. So what reason could a little thing like Squee possibly possess? Though he realized, then, that he hadn't actually met too many other murderers.

 _Not that I have any desire to,_ Johnny affirmed himself. _And I wouldn't really consider myself a murderer, so much as a cleanser,_ he decided – _yes, that's_ _more appropriate, less animal. I am calculating, serving a purpose. People are just dreadful, whether or not they take note of their evils, the human race is inherently insidious. Rampant to fulfill their selfish motives, what bumbling pests! Their tiny minds filled to the brim with deceit, conceit, elitism –_

He hadn't noticed how long he'd been staring off into space, he realized suddenly, as he noticed a persistent tug on the edge of his shirt. Startled, he jumped a bit, which only made the child squeak in horror.

"You were sleeping, but your eyes were all open," Todd said, clutching his bear closer to his tiny chest.

"I was just thinking," He retorted defensively.

"Well, you were __thinking__ for three minutes and twenty two seconds!"

He didn't know what to say to that, so he just grimaced. "Don't you have a bedtime?"

"Yeah. It's at eight o' clock __pmmm__." He pronounced it with a hum instead of a saying it properly, as a set of initials. Johnny saw no need to correct him. "But there's a monster in my room now anyways."

"What kind of monster?"

Todd looked genuinely frightened just at the thought of it. "I don't know," he said, concentrating hard, "It only comes out at night. And it makes very bad noises."

Johnny seemed somewhat troubled by this. "Er, what noises?"

He hoped it wasn't something like 'someone's corpse being slowly shredded by a cheese grater to make festive confetti,' or 'the sizzling sounds flesh makes when you pour certain acidic chemicals on it and the strained pleading gurgles it accompanies,' because that would fall on him. Hypothetically.

"Um, hissing. Like a big snake." He wrung Schmee's paw in his hand.

"Are you sure it isn't just...a radiator, or a fridge, or something?" He asked, relieved. (Though that __could__ still be sizzling flesh. Please don't mention a suspicious meaty smell...)

"What's a radio-ator?" He asked.

He thought for a minute on how to explain. "It's a big machine that makes houses warm. And it, uh, it hisses." He wondered why he was taking the time to elaborate on all of this instead of taking the misguided little squirt by the armpits and putting him back to bed. He __did__ live next door.

"Oh." Todd was comically furtive. "Okay."

He gazed down at his dingy yellow slippers, partially caked in grayish dirt. "Does that mean I have to go home now? It was scary walking all the way here. And cold."

Johnny considered getting up and putting him back in his parent's custody, but decided against it for now. "Uh, you can go back in the morning, it won't be so bad then."

Todd smiled. Played just like a fiddle, he thought. But he was hardly bothered.

"I don't have any food to give you," he said, "Or, uh, many bedtime stories, or anything...or beds."

"That's okay," Todd said, toddling over to the couch. He carefully slid off his shoes and sat down, leaning into the corner. Johnny swept some crumbs off the cushions, and took the fork back to an overflowing pile of dishes built up in the sink, tossing it with a clink into the rest of the mess.

Johnny left the room to ensure nearly every door was locked tight, particularly the basement. Noting the draft, he returned to wordlessly offer a tiny gray blanket, displaying it in the air. It was the cleanest one he had. Todd nodded, and he draped it over him.

They both sat silently for a second. If he was being honest with himself, Johnny was beginning to regret hosting a child in this kind of place, but how could he send him away to those dreadful parents of his? He hadn't expected such a request, but what else could he do but be courteous? The kid just sat there, quiet and feeble.

"Do you wanna watch TV?" he offered, breaking the silence. Todd nodded again, a grin on his face.

He turned on the box and adjusted the coat hanger positioned atop it with vague annoyance, then found a connection. The picture came up fuzzy at first, then clear. Johnny tossed him the remote, switched off the lights, and sat nervously beside curled feet. A round little face was illuminated white by the screen.

 _His mind is a clean slate,_ Johnny pondered, moved by his radiant innocence, _Untouched, in part, by the horrors of modern society – and I'm letting him watch television. Stupid idea. Stupid, stupid._

They sat a while without speaking again, and Todd flipped through the channels with reckless abandon, until he came across familiar cartoon faces.

"You know," Johnny piped up, "You're welcome here, even if there aren't any scary snakes in your room." But when he looked down at him, his eyes were still glued to the tube. _"Unless you hear angry screams,"_ he said in hasty addendum.

"I still don't know why you were scared-screaming," Todd said softly, muffled by the blanket, and practically cocooned in the thing. He looked wary of what the answer might be.

Johnny felt a little wary about it himself. "I...don't really know, either, Squee. It's hard to remember."

The television was alight with a commercial, complete with loud colors and perfect smiling faces. His gut wrenched a little, thinking of the right words to say. "I was dreaming...I, uh...don't usually dream."

"When I have bad dreams, Schmee helps cheer me up," Todd offered, holding him aloft for Johnny to see. The teddy's seams were frightfully loose, and an uneven button eyes hung by little black strings. He could feel them bore into his skull with silent, palpable judgment. It made his guts squirm.

"He says all of the monsters are just in my head," Squee continued, "I imagine them, all by myself, so they can't really hurt me...Except the aliens, but I know how to get rid of those."

"That's...okay." Johnny said, wincing at the stuffed atrocity. "It...wasn't a monster."

"But dreams are just make-believe. Whatever made you scared was make-believe too."

"It wasn't made up, either." He looked very uncomfortable, as if in pain, almost, and shifted a bit in his seat. Todd sat in silent confusion, and took his bear back into his arms. Things would be simpler now if the child just hadn't had the audacity to check on him.

"Why did you come in my house, anyway? You said it's too scary outside at night to go home. But you came over here. You braved it for a while just to visit, didn't you? And you said I was screaming."

"I didn't want to be eaten by the big bad snake. It was louder than ever."

Johnny sounded irritated now. "The snake is make-believe too, Squee. It's a radiator."

"Okay," he said dishearteningly. "What did you dream of?"

He sighed, crossing his arms. "I don't recall very well. I was remembering something that happened before I, uh…moved here. It's kinda hazy."

Todd blinked. "What does 'hazy' mean?"

"It means...something that's hard to think of. Or see."

"Oh," he said. "Dreams are __hazy__ a lot."

The commercials continued their consumerist parade. Todd watched prices flash on the screen in big yellow numbers that were more than he knew how to count. Without tearing his gaze, he chimed in, "I also wanted to see if you were dead."

The sing-song voices of a car dealership advertisement filled what would be silence with a cheery jingle instead. Johnny found it sickening, but Todd didn't seem to mind, and he stared on, stoic as ever. _It's no marvel that children get brainwashed by these infernal things,_ he thought, mind wandering at the drop of a pin.

He gathered his thoughts again. _Screaming...screaming...I was screaming, and he thought I was dead..._

"Did you... _ _want__ me to be dead, Squee?" he asked, a little offended at the idea. But he supposed he understood.

The boy shook his head diligently. "Nope," he said, still fixated on the television.

"So...you were __worried__ about me?" Johnny sounded even more alarmed at this than the former.

"Sorta."

He sat for a moment, processing the idea. "Okay."

That was all there was to say on the matter, he thought.

As the night grew colder, the television picture began to fizzle and turn into busy, dotted static, washing the room in a dull white light. The stereo buzzed a quiet electronic ambiance, nearly harmonic through the silence of the dark. Now and then, insect legs skittered by, and slow yellow flashes of passing headlights wandered the ceiling, illuminating dust motes and splintering wood.

Two slumbering bodies lay casting shadows, one draped dramatically over the edge, reminiscent of a limp scarecrow, and the other curled tightly, as if a small animal. Sleep came in a single, heavy wave. Todd dreamed peacefully, and the only noises Johnny made were snores.

When light sliced through the boarded windows again, it hit the man's eyes in blinding ferocity. The child had gone, leaving the blanket in a bundle still indented by his form. Johnny felt it idly, noting that it was still warm.

He heard little footsteps trotting away through the lawn.


End file.
